Tracy Flick Can't Win (Tracy Flick #2) (36)

“Good job.” Glenn craned his neck to meet the tall kid’s eyes. “You made some terrific shots out there.”

Blake muttered his thanks and stepped onto the bus. Marcus Turner was next. Bundled in his winter coat, he looked younger than he had on the court, a lot less fierce. He paused after the fist bump, waiting to be told how great he was.

Glenn hesitated. He wanted to say, Don’t be a dick like Vito Falcone. Treat other people with respect. You’re not better than anyone else. But the words stayed in his throat.

“Great game tonight,” he said. “Really outstanding.”

Marcus nodded, accepting his due. There were a few more Green Meadow kids after that, and then the bus drove away, white smoke pouring from the exhaust pipe. When it was out of sight, Glenn did a few jumping jacks in the empty parking lot, warming himself up, killing a little time, wishing there were someplace to go besides home.





- 19 - Tracy Flick




I’ve never done any online dating—it seems like a terrible idea for a woman in the public eye—but I’ve heard numerous colleagues complain about how exhausting it can be, meeting stranger after stranger, serving yourself up like the daily special, and then somehow finding the energy and optimism to do it all over again with the next person in line.

You want to know what’s a hundred times worse? Interviewing to be a high school Principal. If a date doesn’t work out, you’ve only lost a few hours of your time. But the interview process can stretch out for months, requiring you to jump through multiple hoops as you advance from one round to the next. And there are so many people involved in the vetting process—parents, the School Board, politicians, curriculum specialists, paraprofessionals, and on and on—you never really know who’s making the decisions, what kinds of discussions are going on behind closed doors, or even whether an entire job search is a sham with a foregone conclusion. It’s possible to do everything right—impress the stakeholders, wow the Admin Team, nail the budget analysis—and still come up empty-handed.

Believe me, I’ve been there. By the time I was interviewing to be Jack Weede’s successor at GMHS, I’d already been a finalist to lead three other high schools. I guess you could look on the bright side and say, Hey, that’s pretty good, you’re clearly a viable candidate, it’s only a matter of time until you land the top job and get your chance to shine, and sometimes I was able to do that, to maintain a positive attitude and a healthy sense of perspective. But I’d be lying if I said that every one of those defeats didn’t take something out of me. They undermined my confidence, sapped my energy, and damaged my reputation.

All the jobs I’d competed for were within half an hour of Green Meadow, and word got around. My prospective employers checked references and made phone calls, and some of them even visited GMHS to speak directly to my colleagues and supervisors. So everyone in the local education community knew that I was looking to ascend to the next level, which meant they also knew that I’d failed to achieve my goal, because there I was, still the Assistant Principal, Jack Weede’s loyal sidekick. Once that happens a few times, you start to get that stink on you—the stink of the runner-up, the also-ran, the perennial bridesmaid. If you’re not careful, it can become your signature odor, your very own personal scent.

Eau de Loser.



* * *



Coming in second too many times is tough on anyone’s self-esteem, but it was especially hard for me, because it brought back memories I’d prefer not to dwell on. Back when I was in high school, I lost an election for President of the Student Government Association because a teacher—our civics instructor, if you can believe that—tampered with the votes.

It sounds crazy, but it’s true. This crooked teacher—a man I’d liked and respected and learned a lot from—wanted my male opponent to win so badly, he tossed two ballots into the trash, turning me from a winner into a loser. That’s how close it was—I won by a single vote—which was humiliating in and of itself, because I was so overqualified for the job it was ridiculous. I’d been preparing to run for President ever since middle school, and probably even before that. I’d climbed my way methodically up the ladder of Student Government—Homeroom Representative as a freshman, Secretary the following year (highly unusual for a sophomore), and then Treasurer as a junior—putting in the time, doing the work, earning the trust of my fellow students. Or at least I thought so, until half of them stabbed me in the back by voting for my completely unqualified but super-popular rival.

For a while, in my twenties, I tried to turn it into a funny story, but no one ever laughed. I think it just made people wonder if there was something wrong with me, and I couldn’t help wondering that myself, because why else would a teacher hate me so much that he’d ruin his life just to stop me from getting something I desperately wanted and totally deserved?

In the end, the fraud was exposed. The teacher resigned and I became President, but my victory never felt as good or as clean as it should have. The whole experience left a bad taste in my mouth that still hasn’t gone away, and I doubt it ever will.



* * *



That said, things appeared to be looking pretty good on the GMHS front. Kyle had told me back in August that I was the overwhelming favorite, and it still felt that way at the beginning of February. My first-round interview had been a lovefest, one softball question after another lobbed at me by a large and diverse panel of friendly faces. I made the case for a Flick administration, strategically distancing myself from Jack without throwing him under the bus, or casting a shadow on my own performance as Assistant Principal. It’s not an easy tightrope to walk—just ask Al Gore—but I thought I handled it pretty well, promising new energy and a shift in emphasis, rather than a wholesale change in direction.